The appointment of Mojtaba Khamenei as Iran’s new supreme leader comes at a moment of extraordinary upheaval for the Islamic Republic. The announcement was made shortly after midnight Monday by Iran’s powerful assembly of experts, the clerical body responsible for choosing the country’s top leader, following the death of his father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in US-Israeli airstrikes earlier this month.
The leadership change unfolds amid an intensifying regional war that erupted after the strikes that killed the elder Khamenei.
